TRADITIONAL FOLK ART COMMUNITY AND URBAN TRANSFORMATION: THE CASE OF THE ARTISTS' VILLAGE AT KALIGHAT, INDIA

摘要

The location of the Kalighat temple attracted the patuas from distant villages to migrate so they could make a living by selling the fruits of their creativity, which was also a traditional community practice. The urban character of Kalighat influenced the traditional folk art, which gave birth to a unique genre: Kalighat pat painting. The patuas made a good liveli-hood from their art until technological changes in the early 20th century made their craft no longer economically viable. This affected the urban and social fabric of the whole artists' community, which ultimately resulted in Kalighat pat painting becoming a dying art form. However, this change could have been mitigated by taking action to find alternatives such as promoting tourism based on the creative economy or providing grants and aid to preserve the traditional folk art form to a considerable extent rather than allowing it to be damaged.